mulegemichael
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orange algae bloom??
we just picked some amigos up at the loreto airport yesterday and as we were headed back north past the bay of concepcion noticed huge orange patches
of what appeared to be algae of some kind...really thick gooey stuff sometimes covering a few acres...bright bright orange in color....any experiences
with this glop?
dyslexia is never having to say you\'re yrros.
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bajajudy
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That was all over the place when we were up that way but it was red. We were going to swim in front of the Desert Inn but all the rocks were covered
in the yuck.
We couldnt help but notice that there was no one at Requeson and wondered if perhaps the smell from the algae was too strong at low tide.
La Perla was full.
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mulegemichael
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all of the beaches, including requeson are now full of rvs but boy is this a strange looking bright orange goop that's all over the bay.
dyslexia is never having to say you\'re yrros.
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rts551
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Loreto Bay effluent
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RnR
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Could be krill.
Need to look really closely and see if it is gooey algae or small orange "shrimpy looking" things.
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Russ
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Wonder if it's the stuff the whales were interested in?? Did you see them inside the bay today?
Bahia Concepcion where life starts...given a chance!
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ecomujeres
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Registered: 9-10-2006
Location: Mulege, BCS & Oakland, CA
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It's a bioluminescent dinoflagellate called Noctiluca. It's normal for this time of the year in the bay. A lot of people call it red tide, but this
is not the organism that causes the actual red tide which filter feeding mollusks take in and then poison people who eat them.
I'm not sure of the exact species, but you can read more about it here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noctiluca_scintillans
It's cool to play in it at night, splashing or stirring it, or throwing a shell or sand into the water, or just watching the wavelets light up in a
pulse down the length of the beach. Gotta go out in the night and check it out!
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Mulegena
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Registered: 11-7-2006
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Baja's mind-blowing bioluminescence
First experienced this wonderful phenomenon 31 years ago on my first trip to Baja. We were camped at Requison Beach down in the bay. From my bed in my
old '65 VW van with the double-doors wide open I could see the fish jumping out there in the darkness. This was great and I've been hooked on Baja
ever since.
A nighttime boat ride is trippy. You can see the turbulence in the boat's wake and clearly see the many fishes swimming by underneath.
A couple years ago I did a nighttime scuba dive while there was bio-luminescence-- that was a gas and a half! Everything was so lit up down there. We
didn't need our divelights. We divers, and everything else in the ocean was glowing!
edited to change the spelling of Requison Beach to, more correct, Playa Requeson... don't want the spelling police after me... however, I'm a mind to
take a drive down there very soon for to enjoy the magic.
[Edited on 2-21-2013 by Mulegena]
edited again to spell bioluminescence right-- there!
[Edited on 2-21-2013 by Mulegena]
"Raise your words, not your voice. It's rain that grows flowers, not thunder." ~Rumi
"It's the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it." ~ Aristotle
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bill erhardt
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Running at night, or in the early morning dark, the phosphorescence is so bright in concentrations of the plankton that if you glance down into the
wake you will lose night vision. Schools of fish breaking the surface around the boat look like meteors skittering along the surface. And, large
fish or sea animals sounding, like depth charges.
It is a good time to be out and about.
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Skipjack Joe
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Pompano posted pictures of the blooms here about 5 years ago:
http://forums.bajanomad.com/viewthread.php?tid=23871#pid2178...
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Pablito1
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Back in the 1960s I had a 12 foot Sears boat with a 5.5 HP motor. With the small motor most of the time it was wide open throttle to go some place. We
were diving along some cliffs 14 miles below Puertocetos and there was several patches of this red or orange stuff. If you hit one of these patches
with the boat you could hear the motor speed up due to the water being slicker I suppose.
Regards, Pablito
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Osprey
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Location: Baja Ca. Sur
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Baja Nocturne
Sometimes it takes countless trips to all parts of Baja California in the daytime to get a really good look at all it has to offer. Having said that,
what about the Baja nights? Over time adventurers grow bold enough to stumble about after sundown to find out what’s on the other side of the magic.
May I report, for you and me, a little of what lies just beyond the gathering shadows?
Baja has the Georgia springtime fireflies that children capture in mason jars but ours are in the water and much more elusive. We can watch but we
cannot capture. They aren’t flies or bugs or beetles, they are plankton; not hundreds but googles of them lighting up the shallows. You need only move
your hand through the waters in the darkness to be constantly thrilled by the emerald light show. One of the best ways to enjoy the special show in
the shallow waters of Bahia Concepcion is to run, swim, gyrate with your naked sweetheart with such a frenzy that the tiny animals light up, like a
time delay film, all the personal paths and holes and tunnels in the water of your movement as though you were painting with radioactive jade. You
stop, take a breath, hug --- total darkness without a hint that the magic was there.
Around Loreto you make your own bait before false dawn and as you leave the beach in the panga, if the timing is right you will be treated to fire of
another kind. As your boat tic, tic, tics across the bay in the darkness, the sound of the motor, the bow wave excites fish of every kind, turtles,
tiny bait fish and unseen monsters of the deep to speed away from your small craft while leaving behind majestic tunnel-trails of bioluminescence.
If you spend a day on the mountains you’ll love the easy lifestyle of the families there but should you stay for dinner you’ll catch that strangely
different light in the canyons just at dark that seems to leave behind a quiet that is complete. It fills up again around the fire as the children
play. The ranchero who showed you the corrals and plants and animal tracks by the stream now holds an aboriginal light in his eyes – he sees the same
change in your eyes and you might make the connection that you are both touching on the big time-line graph, both jammed together in the slot that
shows the next small jump above hunter-gatherers.
You might have just enough brandy and mineral water at a quinceanera to pick up a guitar and play and sing for the few hardy souls that lasted under
the trees and lights, the balloons and streamers till nearly dawn. Somewhere in the night, as the children crept away for their beds, the night, for
you brandy revelers, took on a new meaning, a celebration of music and dancing – survival, staying power for those caught in the special lambent globe
the grape spirit forms right from the cup. In such a state I have seen the many glorious Van Gogh halos pulsing from the street lamps of our little
village. (His stunning Road with Cypress and Star)
Sometimes the darkness has its own sound. Waves lapping make a darkening rhythm, the faint flutter of diving poor-will feeding near the shore seems to
help pull down the black curtain. Wind fluttering against your tent or camper reminds you the special darkness has brought you the precious gift of
solitude. You can still get lost in your own secret place in this little part of Mexico – the kind you remember from your childhood, your place in the
barn loft, the garden, the safe, quiet serene place where you were the master of darkness.
In the raw desert I have shared the darkness with the great horned owl, the babisuri, the civet cat, the coyote, the carpenter bee and all the bugs
that whiz and whirl and sting and bother but I will take the darkness any way it comes. When there, I think about the early ones and how they must
have had to hunker down and stay put as soon as the shadows lengthened – most of the desert could be a killing field for those unprotected who might
have been driven to flight. For most of us pilgrims the darkness is a place we store what we need, close at hand, to survive till first light.
They used to tell us kids “There’s nothing in the dark that wasn’t there when the light was on”. That’s not entirely true but what is there in this
part of Mexico is unique and irreplaceable.
So, come on down. I’ll leave the light off for you.
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